


Proximity

by flootzavut



Series: It Happened One Night [4]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Angst, Bisexual BJ Hunnicutt, Bisexual Hawkeye Pierce, Episode Related, Episode: s04e02 Change of Command, Friendship, Letters, M/M, Season/Series 04, Sequel, Sharing a Bed, Swamp(y) Kisses, queer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-29
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-29 19:11:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14479293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/pseuds/flootzavut
Summary: "It's the only thing that makes sense, the only thing keeping BJ and his sanity in the same zip code."BJ's first week in Korea.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [onekisstotakewithme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/onekisstotakewithme/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Period of Adjustment](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13982910) by [flootzavut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/pseuds/flootzavut). 



> for onekisstotakewithme and all the other denizens of The Swamp ♥️
> 
> You don't have to read the other PoV for this one to make sense, but they are complementary.
> 
> You probably do need to have read at least one of the Welcome to Korea stories in this series!

* * *

**_Proximity_ **

* * *

 

The night after his first surgeries, on a day when he did three amputations before breakfast, BJ creeps into Hawkeye's bed, desperate not to be alone. Hawkeye is almost asleep, but he rolls over and smiles, eyes edging open for a moment, budges over to make room and loops an arm around BJ like they've done this a thousand times. It's comfortable and comforting.

It shouldn't be, he's sure; lying in Hawkeye's arms - Hawkeye, whom he met barely a day and a half ago - should not be this easy, should not seem so natural, but it does. This connection with Hawkeye is the only thing since he arrived that makes any sense at all, the only thing that feels real and normal and good. The only thing keeping BJ and his sanity in the same zip code.

He wrote Peg this afternoon, waxed lyrical about the new friend he made, and he wonders if she'll pick up on it. He thinks so - he hopes so. She usually has him figured out, even when he can't figure himself out.

He wishes he could call her, say 'Peg, I met someone, and he's amazing, and I'm scared. Peg, I love you and I always will, but what do I do? I can't stay away from him. It's terrifying, Peg. I wish you were here and could meet him (and love him) too.' Hell, he wishes he could write that to her, could be honest about this upheaval, didn't have to worry about military censors reading his confession and sending him home in disgrace. It would be one thing for Peggy to know; it would be disastrous for the army to find out. Peggy loves and understands him. The army would smear his name and dog the rest of his life.

So he wrote half-truths and hints, begging her silently to read between the lines and tell him she does understand, and she doesn't hate him, and she'll forgive him for not being able to keep Hawkeye out of his head or heart, for so quickly falling under this man's spell.

The whole camp reeks of despair and death, but Hawkeye is so vibrant and alive. BJ is irresistibly drawn in and he knows, he  _knows_ , there's no way he can keep his distance.

* * *

Time in Korea seems to stretch on forever. Each hour lasts a day, each day lasts a week, and BJ doesn't want to think about how long weeks and months are going to feel. It's boredom peppered with stress, terror and horror, and there are only two things that actually help: writing Peg and climbing in bed with Hawkeye.

BJ tries to rely on the former and tries to feel guilty about the latter; both attempts fail. Insofar as anything here is comfortable or routine, sharing a cot becomes comfortable and routine. Talking into the small hours, falling asleep in Hawkeye's embrace, makes sense in a way nothing else here does.

Hawk sleeps with his nose buried in the hollow of BJ's throat and a hand tucked up under his shirt. It's both touching and disconcerting to have Hawkeye's fingers splayed over his back, Hawkeye's breath warm on his skin. BJ's not sure if it's just the need for human contact or if it's more personal than that, but either way, it's too much and not enough all at the same time.

He's honestly surprised he can fall asleep, though even when he's very...  _distracted_ , he's so tired, and being in Hawkeye's bed is such a relief, he sleeps incredibly well. He's mostly just glad Hawkeye either hasn't noticed or has chosen not to mention the way BJ's body reacts when they're tangled up together.

Frankly, BJ's grateful for the cold showers everyone else whines about, especially when Hawk has the same problem, a problem BJ can't ignore when it's pressed up against his thigh and it takes all his self-control not to pull Hawkeye in and grind against him until they both come apart. It's a line BJ won't cross, but oh God, how he wants to. When he was drunk, he wanted to touch Hawkeye all over, he wanted Hawkeye's lips on his skin, everywhere, but even with sobriety on his side, he still... wants. Wants more than he's at all comfortable with.

When he's not snuggling with his tentmate or writing his wife, BJ joins Hawkeye in drinking much more than could possibly be acceptable in any other circumstance. The booze doesn't help, not really - not the way large doses of Peggy and Hawkeye do - but it does numb him a little. It's a way to get through the hours of boredom and forget about the hours of horror.

Frank is exactly as much of a pill as Hawkeye suggested, but even his most ludicrous demands and orders are easy to laugh at when BJ has an ally, a comrade in arms (sometimes literally), when he knows that no matter what the day throws at him, he has his letters to Peggy and his warm, comfortable spot in Hawkeye's bed to keep him afloat.

He shouldn't get used to this. He's walking through a minefield, and the longer he keeps going, the more likely it is someone will get a limb blown off, but he can't pull away from the only thing in this entire country that feels right.

* * *

Sometime partway through his first week, BJ half-wakes while it's still dark to find Hawkeye wrapped around his waist and tucked up under his chin, lips pressed to his throat as usual, and doesn't know what disturbed him. It's dark and quiet, and Hawkeye's cot may be just like any other, but to BJ it feels like the safest place in all Korea.

Then Hawk sighs sleepily and murmurs something that sounds very much like 'I love you, BJ Hunnicutt', and BJ can't respond or even breathe. He has no idea if he misheard (would it be wishful thinking or his worst fears confirmed?), and he wouldn't know how to ask.

He's definitely awake now.

Hawkeye nuzzles in and breathes deeply against BJ's skin like he needs BJ's scent to survive. BJ hauls Hawk in closer still, and something in him aches so hard it's almost physical, twisting around his heart, constricting his lungs. He has no idea how to deal with this, what to make of it, what it might mean. If he weren't so grateful for Hawkeye, if Hawkeye hadn't saved his sanity and possibly his life already, if he didn't already care about Hawkeye so damn much, BJ could almost hate him for how confusing he is.

As it is, BJ holds Hawkeye tight and thinks of Peggy and wonders how his life got so quickly and so irrevocably turned upside down.

He knows this can't go on, even as innocent as it's been. Someone will come in too early in the morning or too late at night, someone will get suspicious of the way they're always in one another's space and will investigate. The army won't look kindly on two men sharing a bed, and it won't matter if all they do is talk and hold each other, keep the darkness and the war at bay for a little while. No one will care how chaste it is.

Or else they'll forget themselves and give in to the chemistry that's been there from the start. They'll fall from snuggling and the way Hawk kisses the corner of BJ's jaw when he thinks BJ's asleep into real kisses and touching and undressing and- things BJ daren't let himself imagine. They could so easily slip from this unusually intimate friendship he can almost excuse into something more like an affair.

He never thought anyone would get inside his defences like this. Or at least that if someone did, it would be a petite, pretty nurse, someone who reminded him of Peggy but who couldn't possibly hold a candle to her and wouldn't present a serious temptation.

A snarky, difficult, brilliant fellow surgeon, with defences of his own several storeys high, with his wit and his bright blue eyes and his wicked smile, his taste for terrible jokes and his deranged sense of humour and his still, funny and sad and oddly vulnerable... BJ wasn't prepared for him at all.

It can't go on. 'I love you, BJ Hunnicutt.' It's just another reason this can't continue, but what's BJ supposed to do with the realisation that he doesn't want it to stop?

It's not something he's often felt, this magnetic pull, let alone so strongly. It's fascinating, enticing, tempting. And frightening. He isn't stupid, he knew he liked guys, that kissing a man was just as enjoyable as kissing a woman, but this... this raw, molten thing in his chest is not that. That was ice cream; this is an avalanche.

The last person he was so drawn to, he fell in love with. It never occurred to him it was even possible to find it again, to have a connection this vital with two different people, never mind at the same time.

What to do with these emotions, he has no idea.


	2. Chapter 2

BJ spends most of the week telling himself this absolutely cannot, should not and _must not_ continue, but it still knocks him sideways when the decision is snatched away. Seeing Frank taken down a peg or two is joyous. Going back to the Swamp and realising Frank will be back here, that they no longer have even the scant privacy they've enjoyed this last week, makes his heart sink. He and Hawk look at each other as they start to dismantle the bar, and neither of them has to say a word.

Frank is Frank. There will be no more bedsharing. Now it's over, BJ can finally admit to himself how much it meant. How much he'll miss the peaceful, secure place in Hawkeye's arms he's been enjoying so much.

Has he been fooling himself all week thinking this isn't already some kind of affair? He's not in love with Hawkeye ('yet...' says a voice in the back of his mind he can't entirely dismiss), but he cares deeply about Hawkeye, has shared a bed with and bared his soul to Hawkeye this last week the way he rarely has with anyone. Hawkeye probably knows him better than anybody in the world besides Peggy, and it's only been a week.

Isn't that almost as bad as if they'd been sleeping together in the other sense? Or is it even worse?

God, how long does it take a letter to get to California and how long will it take for her reply to come back? Every mail call until he hears back from Peg - until she replies to  _that_  letter and he finds out whether she caught his meanings and if she'll forgive him - will be an ordeal. He's caught between horror at the thought he may already have betrayed her, and how much he wants to share this with her, not hide it from her. He can't make sense of it, but he can't deny how true it feels; if he had a way to introduce her to Hawkeye, he would, without hesitation.

_Peg, I didn't know I could feel this about anyone else. I never felt it before you. I never expected to feel it for someone new. I don't understand it. I'm afraid of where it might lead._

_Peg, I'm terrified_.

As the day goes on, it becomes more and more difficult for BJ to squash the ache in his chest. He knew this was coming, knew it had to, knew it wasn't realistic to imagine he could share a bed with Hawkeye for the rest of the war, but the knowledge was a distant thing he could shove aside. Now it's immediate, and even more painful than he feared.

Even the news that Frank has run away - however ridiculous - is only temporarily amusing when part of BJ is twisting and breaking. He needs a moment, he needs one last shred of privacy with Hawkeye.

Hawkeye has made this week bearable, in so many ways. BJ wonders if Hawk realises how much that means to him. How much Hawk has come to mean to him. He hasn't a clue how he's going to put it all into words, but he's not even gonna get a chance to say it unless he  _makes_  a chance.

The Swamp is an unofficial extension to the O Club during the day; they might just as well kiss in the middle of the compound for all the privacy they'd get. They need something better than that for a conversation like the one BJ wants and needs them to have.

They diagnose Klinger and send him away happy, and BJ can't begrudge him, but damnit, this tent is a goldfish bowl. It isn't a conscious decision; he's taking Hawkeye's arm and leading him away before he even knows what he's doing.

Even after a week, BJ's already aware the supply shed is usually used for much more intimate situations than this. The knowledge is underscored by the (he thinks unintentionally) heated look Hawkeye throws his way as he shuts them in.

BJ is rattled, but it also undeniably makes him feel better. It reminds him he's not the only one here who's into men as well as women, that Hawkeye likes guys (that Hawkeye likes  _him_ ). There might be a laundry list of reasons nothing is likely to come of it (BJ can't allow himself to hope), but someone here understands, and that's incredibly comforting.

They stand there for a moment, looking at one another. BJ sternly reminds himself it would be inappropriate and unfair (and just plain wrong) to push Hawk up against the door and kiss him stupid. He's terribly aware of the cot in the corner.

It's too tempting to imagine sliding his hands into Hawkeye's clothing, steering him to the bed and falling down into it together, touching and kissing and- it would be so easy. It would be so good. He has no doubt of that whatsoever. This... this  _thing_  between them, whatever it is, crackles and sparks and could set the world on fire.

"You okay?" Hawk asks, voice gentle.

BJ almost laughs. 'Okay' isn't the word he'd use, but it'll have to do. "Yeah, I'm- I guess I was used to not having Frank in our space. I suppose it's too much to hope that he won't come back."

Hawkeye actually does laugh, and that sound is definitely going to be one of the things that keeps BJ somewhere close to sane. Hawk's entire being lights up with it; it turns him from striking and unconventionally handsome to breathtaking.

"This week would've been a hell of a lot tougher without you," BJ admits. It's a wild understatement, but it's a start.

"I said I'd be there for you. That hasn't changed, BJ," Hawkeye assures him, warm and sincere.

BJ doesn't have the words for how much that means, doesn't know where to start. Hawkeye has dug so deeply and tightly into BJ's heart in the space of one week, and BJ can't even explain it to himself.

The only phrase that captures it is 'I love you', and BJ mustn't say that. He's not certain it isn't somewhat true, but until he hears from Peg, until he figures out exactly what Hawkeye means to him and how much of that he can afford to acknowledge, he can't say it aloud. No matter how much part of him aches to. It wouldn't be fair on any of them.

"Hawk, I-" He stops for a moment, swallows hard. "I want you to know I don't regret it. Any of it.  _Any_  of it," he says, willing Hawkeye to understand.

Hawkeye shuts his eyes. BJ can't interpret the look on his face. It's almost pained. Hawkeye takes a few ragged breaths.

"Hawk?" God, did BJ say the wrong thing?

It takes a second more for Hawkeye to open his eyes again, but it comes with a smile, albeit a fragile one. "I don't regret it either," he says, quiet but firm. "Didn't then. Don't now."

BJ doesn't wish he'd met Hawkeye first, because he could never regret Peggy and Erin, but he can't help wondering what might have been. He knows he could love Hawkeye as deeply and passionately as he loves Peg, given the chance.

"Good," he manages. He grasps Hawkeye's shoulders because he needs so badly to make contact. "I'm glad."

They stare at one another. There's so much BJ wants to say, but he doesn't have the words and it's so damn frustrating. He wants to say he feels a little less alone, a little less afraid (at least of the bombs and the bullets) because of Hawkeye. He wants to say thank you.

Hawkeye leans in closer, and BJ's gaze is drawn irresistibly to his lips, and BJ knows with sudden clarity the one way he can express himself, the one way he can make Hawkeye understand without words. He doesn't allow himself a moment to second guess it; he cups Hawkeye's face in both hands and leans in, slow enough for Hawkeye to stop him if he wants to, then they're kissing again for the first time since that first morning here, and it's just as wonderful and baffling and right as it was then.

BJ doesn't let it go too far, doesn't dare - doesn't, to his chagrin, trust himself not to get carried away - but he imbues it with all the emotion he can, hopes Hawkeye can feel how sincere it is, how much BJ loves him already despite himself. It's everything he can't say, everything he wishes he knew how to explain.

When he reluctantly pulls back, he can't bring himself to move out of Hawkeye's space. He rests his forehead against Hawkeye's and wills his breathing and his heartbeat to slow down.

Hawkeye looks blindsided, and although it was BJ who initiated the kiss, he doesn't feel any less taken aback himself. Sometime in the last week, he forgot exactly how it felt to kiss Hawkeye Pierce, forgot how perfectly it hurt. He isn't going to forget again. Not even if he tries.

"What was that for?" Hawkeye asks eventually. His voice is husky and soft, and BJ likes making him sound that way much too much.

"For luck?" BJ says. He hopes Hawkeye will understand it's just as much of an excuse as it was when Hawkeye used it - that what it mostly means is 'I just  _really_  wanted to kiss you again.'

Hawkeye chuckles, and some of the tension drops from his shoulders. "I think we need more than luck to deal with Ferret Face."

BJ grabs Hawk's hands and holds on tight. "Then call it a thank you."

Hawkeye laughs outright, eyes sparkling and head thrown back. It's all BJ can do not to lean in, repeat the kiss with interest, throw some kindling on this fire.

He confines himself to smiling again. "We have each other's backs, right?"

The look Hawkeye gives him makes him want to know what Hawkeye's thinking and simultaneously makes him glad he doesn't. It's affectionate, warm,  _hungry_. "Yes. Always."

"Then we'll be fine." BJ isn't sure if the reassurance is more for Hawkeye's benefit or his own, but he figures they both need it.

Hawkeye steps forwards, and for a moment BJ thinks Hawkeye will kiss him. It's both exciting and frightening - if they start kissing again, BJ isn't sure he'll be able to stop - and he's saddened and relieved when instead, Hawkeye leans in and wraps both his arms around BJ and holds on tight.

BJ laughs, at Hawkeye and at himself, as he hugs Hawkeye back. He still doesn't have a clue how to deal with all of this, but at least it looks like he won't be alone trying to figure it out.

_~ fin ~_


End file.
